


Salted Earth

by ester_inc



Category: Marvel (Movies), The Avengers (2012), Thor (2011)
Genre: Angst, Consent Issues, Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-02
Updated: 2012-07-02
Packaged: 2017-11-09 01:48:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/449908
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ester_inc/pseuds/ester_inc
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thor finds himself exactly where Loki wants him to be.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Salted Earth

"My brother." The voice, slow and measured, came from the shadows. "Chained to a wall like an animal."

Thor peered into the darkness, his muscles tensing. 

Over the years, Loki had worn many disguises, many outfits -- a battle armor, a wolf's skin, a woman's shape. Now, stepping into the torchlight, he wore something familiar to Thor: the face of a lost brother. He would have looked as he did in Thor's memories of days gone past -- painful now to think about -- but for the gleam in his eyes, a madness fed too often, too well.

"What manner of Asgardian are you," Loki asked as he came closer, "that you would allow yourself to be captured by Midgardian madmen? That you would allow them to separate you from Mjölnir?"

Loki's steps were unhurried, his words edged with false curiosity; a child watching a wingless fly's struggle.

Thor bristled. "I allowed nothing." 

"And you believe this makes it better, not worse?" Loki came to a stop in front of him, standing too close. "That you were taken not because you allowed it, but because you could not stop them?"

"I recognize now your trickery in their plans," Thor said, even though it hurt to acknowledge. "Your motivations escape me, brother. What do you wish to gain by helping these villainous evildoers?"

"Am I not a villainous evildoer, myself, in your eyes? Does that not, in a way, make me their kin?"

"You are _my_ kin," Thor said, a storm simmering in his blood. He had been stripped of his armor, his upper body left bare, and the room temperature was nearly low enough to be uncomfortable -- but now, in anger, his skin had forgotten the chill in the air, the dampness it carried.

"Yet you assume so easily that it is I, helping them," Loki said, his fingertips coming to rest against Thor's sternum, a touch so light a man less wise might have thought it not a threat. "Of course, I went to some trouble to make them believe the same. I'll tell you a secret, Thor, one you would do well to remember: believing in something doesn't make it true."

"I grow tired of your games," Thor said. "Why am I here?"

The smile that appeared then to strain Loki's mouth looked wrong, highlighting all the things that were missing from it, from Loki -- things that had once been, but now existed only in Thor's mind.

"I wished to see you," Loki said simply, as if the time and resources required, the mixing of magic with Midgardian science, the entire, elaborate plan, had been no more effort than setting the table for a guest.

"You are welcome to see me whenever you like," Thor said, and it was true; even after everything Loki had done, Thor would not turn him away.

"As an enemy to fight," Loki said, "or a repentant brother, sworn to abandon his hateful ways. I currently have no interest in either. I wished to see you on my own terms, and thus you are here -- because I made it so."

"And what would you have of me, now that I am at your mercy?"

"I haven't yet decided," Loki said, careless, sliding his fingers up to Thor's throat. "Perhaps I would listen to you, your attempts to convince me to let you go, to give up the path of evil and return home with you, to soak in your righteousness and be born anew -- so that you might delude yourself into believing, once more, that you have love for me, and that I am happy in the shadow of that love. Would you like that?"

Thor did not reply, his gaze steady on Loki's bright, shattered eyes.

"No? Then perhaps I would take my pound of flesh. Your blood, to paint my lips with. I would like that, I think."

Loki held Thor's gaze, searching for cracks as he pressed his fingers down harder, the promise of violence hovering in the air between them. Thor couldn't tell if Loki meant it -- if it would be possible for him to rip Thor into pieces and be happier for it -- and yet, he was unafraid, the beat of his heart steady and strong. 

Loki tilted his head, his touch becoming light again.

"Or perhaps," he said, "I would give you something you desire."

So saying, he knelt in front of Thor, graceful and fluid, trailing his fingers over Thor's bare torso and lower, his touch becoming muted when his hands came to rest on Thor's thighs. Thor took a sharp breath, his heart, steady until now, skipping a beat.

"Stand up," he said, the words coming out in a ragged whisper instead of the command he'd meant them to be.

"Is this not what you've always wanted?" Loki inquired innocently, smoothing his palms over Thor's legs as if interested in the texture of the fabric covering them. "Me, kneeling before you." 

"I have always wanted you," Thor said, half-choked, "to be by my side, not at my feet."

"Given how many times you must have told that to yourself," Loki said, "you might even believe it to be true."

Thor could not speak, his reaction to the shape of Loki's hands more damning than a thousand words.

"Does it make you uncomfortable, how much you like this?" Loki leaned in, his lips a breath away from where Thor wanted them the least, where he wanted them the most. "Does it ... excite you?"

"Loki -- do not --" Thor broke off as Loki laughed and drew back.

Standing up, Loki pressed himself against Thor, grinding their hips together once, twice; a tease, nothing more. "Thank you."

Thor swallowed. His voice was rough when he spoke. "What are you thanking me for?"

"For the confirmation." An odd half-smile played with the corners of Loki's mouth. "You've never been good at keeping secrets. Did you think I never saw, never understood?"

Thor closed his eyes. He'd always loved well, and Loki above all else. Above reason, many would say. The more shameful aspects of that love -- the attraction no brother should feel -- he'd buried so deep that he sometimes forgot it existed.

"I suppose this scenario isn't an exact match to your fantasies." Loki slid his hands along Thor's arms until he could lace their fingers together, huffing a laugh when Thor didn't reject the touch. "Perhaps if our positions were reversed? If you had the power to make me do whatever you wished?"

"No." Bracing himself, Thor opened his eyes.

"No?"

"I have never had that power, nor have I wanted it," Thor said. He might best Loki in brute strength, but no equation with Loki in it would ever be as simple as that. "If I ever did have such power, I wouldn't -- I would never do that to you."

"How do you know you would not, if you lack the means? If you have never been tested?" Loki wanted to know, rubbing his nose against Thor's in a mockery of affection.

"I know," Thor said, calm, unmoving.

Loki sighed. "Does it not get tedious, to always be so moral and morally superior? Does it not get boring, to be so _good_ all the time?"

"Perhaps you should try it," Thor said, "and find out for yourself."

Loki grinned, sharp and sudden and genuine. "Such underhanded logic, Thor. It suits you. But I already told you, I have currently no interest in your good intentions."

He pulled his hands away from Thor's, and Thor craned his head, watching Loki's fingers as they caressed the runes carved into the metal holding Thor in place.

"I helped with these," Loki said, casual. "Fine work, if I do say so myself."

The chains fell away at his touch, and Thor was free.

Thor didn't think, he lunged, trying to get a hold of Loki -- but his hands grasped at nothing, Loki's image flickering, disappearing. Loki's amused laughter echoed in the dark, unseen corners of the room. 

Straightening with as much dignity as he could muster, Thor forced himself to accept that Loki had, once more, slipped out of his reach.

"Fly away, my golden bird." Loki's voice clung to the shadows, low and intimate. "Tarnish your wings in the blood of my associates, if you must. When you're outside, Mjölnir will once more hear your call."

Then he was gone, the lack of his presence as real as the chill working itself into Thor's bones. 

Thor fled. He had his freedom, or he would soon, but it was clear, they both knew -- 

Loki had won.


End file.
